


Coming Home

by BubuBORG



Series: Team Medi: Gravity and Time [5]
Category: Multi-Fandom, Star Trek, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types, The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien, Thundercats (1985)
Genre: Accidental Death, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Original Character(s), Parallel Universes, Star Trek AU, Team Medi, These Dang Dwarves, bagginshield, multifandom - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2017-02-11
Packaged: 2018-09-11 03:46:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 14,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8952622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BubuBORG/pseuds/BubuBORG
Summary: After the Events of "Decoding Dr. Pines", Thorin is revived.





	1. Everything Has Changed

He found himself in a nice warm bed.  

It wasn’t his first memory since awakening, but it was much less alarming than finding strange faces attempting to calm him, speaking in strange feline languages.  

The two feline doctors still floated in and out of the sunlit bedroom, but they now spoke what sounded like…were they speaking Khuzdul?  

No, wait, they’d put some device into his auricle, and suddenly he could understand…if not the context, then at least the individual words.

“Good morning, Thorin!” The Doctor he’d come to know was Ch’tra greeted him as she entered the bedroom.  Someone was sitting him up for the first time he could recall and fluffing a pillow behind him.  He looked down at himself and he was dressed in some kind of blue sleeping gown, bound in the back.  

“Good morning, Doctor,” Thorin slowly returned the greeting.  Ch’tra was tall, like an elf, but had feline eyes and a fine coating of fur upon her body, and dark rosettes dotted a tawny mane upon her head.  She smiled warmly.

“I have good news for you,” she told him.  “Your wounds have been healed completely, and the toxicological damage that we found has been purged as well.”

Thorin looked up at her with piercing eyes, eyes that hadn’t been as clear in quite a while to his own reckoning.  “There’s usually not so good news to go along with that.”

Ch’tra pursed her lips and nodded.  “This kind of recovery can take several steps, and considering the nature of your injuries, we recommend counseling and slow therapy.  And that doesn’t even consider the fact of your…displacement.”

Thorin hadn’t asked any questions.  Where he was, who Ch’tra was or who she worked for, or how exactly he came to be injured, though those answers came to him slowly.  Painfully.  

Perhaps one question wouldn’t hurt.

“Whose bedroom is this?” he asked.  

Ch’tra smiled.  “This is the private home of someone who volunteered to help you recover.”

It was then that Thorin noticed the bedroom door.  The round door with a polished brass knob.

“Is this…Bag End?” he asked her.  

Ch’tra nodded.  

Thorin put his hands over his face.  “I would be alone now, if you don’t mind, Doctor.”

Ch’tra sounded her compliance and walked toward the door, ducking to get under the threshold.  “Don’t hesitate to push your button if you need anything,” She reminded him.

 

She closed the door behind her, and as door latched shut, she could hear the faint sound of the Khazad man sobbing. 


	2. I Just Want To Know You Better

Dr. Ch'tra walked down the hall of Bag End to the sitting room, where Rose Gamgee and her two eldest daughters were sitting with her own daughter Ch’ki.  Rose offered her a cup of tea.

“Thank you,” Ch’tra said.  

“They’re going to be arriving soon,” Rose told the doctor.  “We don’t mind of course but—why did Mr. Bilbo want him to recuperate _here_?”

“I’m sure he’ll explain in his own usual way,” Ch’tra replied.  “But I suspect it’s because the two of them have a small history together.”

Rose gave the Thunderan a look.  “They don’t, though, do they?  Bilbo’s from _this_ universe and that Thorin in the bedroom is from some _other_.”

“That’s true,” Ch’tra conceded.  “Don’t look at me, I’m just the doctor.”

“And what about all those Dwarves that are going to be crowding into Bag End?” Rose asked.  

“They’re just beaming over from Erebor and the Blue Mountains, Mam,” Elanor reminded her.  “And Dr. Fíli and Chief Kíli.”

“Part of being a doctor is learning to triage the visitors,” Ch’Tra told Rose.  

A chime sang out in the room.  It indicated an incoming communication.  “Screen,” Rose told the room.  The paneling in the sitting room became a comm screen, revealing Captain Reid.  “Rose, I’m sending down the first three guests.  Doctor, how’s your patient?”

“When he realized where he was, he broke down in tears,” Ch’tra told him.

He sighed.  “Bilbo’s about twelve hours away,” He told them.  “And Gandalf?  Who knows.  Mrs. Gamgee, thanks again for opening Bag End for us.”

“It’s nothing,” Rose told him.

Bag End was redesigned to receive guests via transporter in the Parlor.  

Fíli and Kíli entered the sitting room, still in their Starfleet uniforms.  Rose hugged them warmly as they took their tea.  Kíli sat in a chair, while Fíli stood with Ch’tra, who shared Thorin’s chart with him.

“I mean, his recovery is good news,” She told Fíli, who still frowned.  

“This is an alternate version of our uncle,” Fíli carefully told them.  “We cannot judge him in the ways that we would have judged our own departed Thorin.  But these wounds…don’t match up with the way in which he died at Erebor.”

Ch’tra nodded.  “Indeed not.  Nor does the tox screen results match up with any poisoned weaponry.  I’ve recommended a psych consult.”  She looked up at the figure at the sitting room door.  “Oh, hello.”

It was another Khazad dwarf, who looked to be a bit younger than Kíli.  

Fíli looked up and nodded.  “Doctor Ch’tra, this is Ori.  Ori, this is my colleague from the _Mediterranean_.  Also, this is Mrs. Rose Gamgee, one of the current benefactors of Bag End.”

Rose nodded gracefully at the Dwarf with the close-set eyes and the abbreviated beard.  “Master Dwarf.”

“It’s barely changed,” Ori breathed.  “May I?  I promise I won’t touch a thing.”

“Feel free,” Rose said with a smile.  Ori strolled away.

“So when can we go and see him?” Kíli asked, getting right to the point.

“I want to ease him into meeting family members from this reality,” Ch’tra said.  “Too much at once might be too much of a shock.  That’s why I wanted the two of you to be the first instead of your mother.”

“She’ll want to take her time in seeing this Thorin as well, I suspect,” Fíli said.  “Don’t worry.”

Ch’tra took the brothers back to the bedroom, where Ori had already let himself in.  They found him by the bed, knelt down in supplication by Thorin.  Thorin for his part looked confused, but somewhat gladdened to see the familiar face.  “No, get up,” he told Ori softly.

“I have done my duty, and I have delivered you to safety,” Ori told Thorin.  “My fealty to you is complete for now.”

“Do you ask for release?” Thorin asked Ori, who nodded. “It is granted.  Go, with my thanks.”

Ori arose and strode toward the doorway.  He walked to Fíli and told him, quietly, “I have a comm device in case you need more answers.  There’s an elderly Dwarrow out there who needs a baby brother again.”

Fíli took Ori by the head and their foreheads touched.  “Give Dori our love,” Fíli told Ori.  “And thank you.”

At that moment, Ori looked like Fíli’s Ori and tears sprang from his eyes.  “Farewell.”  With that, he strode back to the parlor to be beamed away. 

“Doctor, who are these…gentlemen?” Thorin asked.  

“Hullo, Uncle,” Fíli greeted Thorin, softly.

Thorin looked at Fíli and Kíli both, with a slightly blank look on his face.  “I…died,” He managed to say to them.

Kíli nodded, and began to sniffle.

Fíli took Ch’tra’s medical tricorder and kept his hands busy scanning Thorin.  “You’re…in good hands with my colleague, Dr. Ch’tra,” He said.  “I of course could not assist in reviving you from your wounds because you’re a family member, you see…”

“You are so much older,” Thorin said.  “How much time has passed?”

“Eighty-five years,” Kíli said.  “Much has happened.”

“I am delivered here from another time and another world,” Thorin said.  “You are…versions of my nephews, but not precisely them.”

“That’s correct,” Fíli said, still scanning.

“Put that away,” Thorin admonished, an annoyed look on his face.  Kíli began to smile.  “I’ve had things like that waved in front of me ever since I’ve been awake.”

“I’m sorry, Uncle.”

“What are the two of you wearing?” Thorin continued.  “They almost look like uniforms of the Terran Empire.”

The brothers looked surprised.  “W-well, you see, in this universe, there was no Terran Empire.  There’s a Federation of Planets.”

“Regardless, that is who you serve.  We will have to tell each other so many stories, I see that.”

“We might have to write up a flow chart,” Kíli muttered.

“We have the time,” Fíli assured Thorin. 

 

For the next few hours, Fíli and Kíli told Thorin about the United Federation of Planets, about Starfleet, and about the _USS Mediterranean_.  They touched upon the War of the Ring, and the Rings of Power, but steered away from the Battle of Five Armies.

Because Thorin himself avoided the question, even though it was a bit glaring.

 

“You’re a doctor?”  Thorin said to Fíli.

Fíli nodded.  

And Kíli—you’re an engineer?”

Kíli nodded.

“Who,” Thorin finally asked. “Who sits upon the throne at Erebor?”

The two looked at each other.  “Thorin sits upon the throne at Erebor,” Kíli finally answered.  “Thorin Stonehelm.”

“Your cousin,” Thorin said, flatly.  “His father Dain was slain in those dark times?”

“Yes.” Fíli said.

“You were not crowned as my successor—why, Fíli?” Thorin asked. 

Fíli took Thorin’s hand into his own, and gazed at him.  His eyes became shiny.  “Because, dear uncle, I was dead once too,” he replied

“And I,” Kíli said as well.

“The Battle,” Thorin realized.  

 

Fíli zipped off his uniform shirt, revealing a purple-grey undershirt.  He pulled the back off of that, revealing a long scar up his back.  Kíli did the same, pulling his undershirt up revealing a similar scar along his chest. 

“It was Balin,” Fíli said at last, putting his uniform back together.  “He told the Wizard to save us, to in some way preserve the bloodline.  Gandalf—“

“It was Pallando in our world,” Thorin interrupted.  

“Gandalf took us to the Terran system, and we were revived.” 

 

Thorin sat in bed quietly, looking at his hands.  “You fell in battle.  You died…protecting _him_?”

Fíli and Kíli nodded.  Fíli wiped his nose with his sleeve.

“Your Thorin must have been valiant indeed, to inspire such loyalty among his kin,” Thorin said.  “I wish…”

“ _You_ are our Thorin,” Fíli said at last.  “This can be your home.  Ori said something about protecting you from an Army?”

“The Army of the Yellow Eye,” Thorin whispered.  

“While you are under our protection, you are our kin, Thorin,” Fíli vowed.  “We’ll sort everything else out, but I want to make that clear.”

“Hmm.”  Thorin suddenly looked up.  “I’m hungry!  This is a hobbit’s house; there’s bound to be something.  Let’s have us a little feast.”

Fíli gave Thorin a look he usually reserved for patients.  “Doctor’s orders want to give your system some time to normalize,” he lectured.  “So maybe we’ll stick to something simple.  

Kíli frowned at Fíli nearly pouting.  “ _I_ could eat.”

Fíli left the bedroom and came in not more than five minutes later with a tray of sandwiches.  “Something from the delicatessens of San Francisco,” He told them.  “Reuben sandwiches on rye bread.”

Thorin eagerly took a sandwich and grunted his approval.  “Whoo!  That’s altogether different!”

Fíli followed the sandwiches up with bottles of ginger ale.  Thorin wasn’t prepared for the carbonation and belched through his nose, causing him to begin to laugh despite himself, before cutting himself off.

Fíli excused himself from the room.  This was good, he thought.  Keeping Thorin in good spirits before the crush of…Mahal, what did he call them?  Un-mourners?  Came in to see this alternately alive version of the dead King Under The Mountain.  Ch’tra was right.  He’d keep anyone outside of his mother and the Company and possibly Captain Reid at arm’s length as much as possible.  

“Hey, Doc!” 

Fíli started before he saw the round reptilian face smiling at him, blue eyes crinkling at the edges.  

“Mahal, Mikey, don’t do that!  What are you even doing down here?”

“Cap’n’s orders,” Michelangelo replied with a mock salute.  “He wanted me to help you keep the riffraff out.  Y’know, because I’m so scaaaary!”  The youngest Hamato brother made a comical face, and chuckled despite himself.  “How’re you doing?”

“I mean…” Fíli sighed.  “Just when you think your life can’t get any more surreal, my dear departed kin and King has returned.  

“Dude,” Mikey said.  “My dad’s a giant rat.”

Fíli blinked and was quiet for a moment.  “Well,” he said finally.  “They did say that weird was part of the job.”

“ _Damn_ skippy.”  Mikey said with a nod.  “So…what’s he like?”

“Hrm?” Fíli mumbled.  He was still in his own thoughts.  “He’s…almost like I remembered him.”

“Oh.  So what was _your_ Thorin like?”

Fíli exhaled through his nose and looked up at the ceiling.  “He was…he was alternately aloof with his feelings and then, in turn, very passionate.  He had his prejudices but those he cared for the most he would defend to his dying breath.”  Fíli sighed.  “Which he ultimately did.”

“Yeah?” Michelangelo prodded.  “Because I heard he could be kind of a douche.”

“One can be all that and still be a turd sometimes, young man,” Fíli scolded the Turtle.  “You have three other brothers and should _know_ that score.”

“True,” Mikey said.  “So what were you eating?”

“I fed him some Reuben sandwiches,” Fíli replied.

The Turtle gasped.  “Pizza.”

“I beg your pardon?” Fíli inquired.  “Are you suggesting I feed Thorin Oakenshield pizza?”

“When more of the visitors come around, yeah!  I know for a fact that half of the Company are pizza converts.  Bombur’s pies are the _total_ bomb.”

Fíli narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips.  “If you can get him to do deep-dish Sicilian before he arrives, you’ve got a deal.”

“I’ll pass that along.  As it is, my shift is up.  Man, I didn’t even get to say hi to him.  It’ll probably be Leo, as usual.  He hogs this _entire_ planet sometimes.”

“Thank you for your service,” Fíli told him with a smile.  

“See ya.”  With that, Mikey left to be beamed back up.  Fíli stayed in the hall, but not before he heard a small exchange.

“Hey, new bro!” Mikey exclaimed.

“Hey, new bro,” a voice that Fíli immediately recognized as Bruffi K’gar replied, coming toward the entrance.

“Doctor,” he addressed Fíli.

“Ensign,” Fíli replied to Bruffi.  He remembered the effort that the young Cainian had made to help him get Thorin safely to Arda (Not to mention the Romulan official that he’d been charged with as well).

“Captain Reid’s worked out a visitation schedule for you and Kíli.  The Urs will be beaming in at 16:00, the Ri’s at 18:00 and Gimli and his family an hour after that.  The Lady Dís has announced her intent to visit sometime tomorrow.”

“Fíli?” Thorin’s voice came in through the bedroom.  “Who’re you talking to now?”

“Oh, he’s up,” Bruffi said.  “I’m holding up your visit, I’m so sorry, Doctor.”

“No, no, no,” Fíli replied, grabbing Bruffi by the sleeve into the bedroom.  “Thorin!”

Thorin started at first at Bruffi’s hound like, canine features, but still managed a faint smile.  “I only caught a glimpse of the fast-talking green one.  I imagine I’m going to see a lot more off-worlders now.”

“Hello,” Bruffi awkwardly greeted Thorin.  “I’m Ensign Bruffi K’gar, I’m helping your…Doctor Fíli and Chief Kíli keep things orderly.”

Kíli grinned and beckoned Bruffi toward the bed.  “Bruffi’s a good lad.  I was happy to have him under my tutelage when he was a cadet.”

“To hear them speak, the crew of your ship are an extended family,” Thorin said to Bruffi, who nodded, but said nothing.

“Mahal’s balls, Bruffi, relax!” Kíli admonished the Cainian.  “He’s not going to bite.”

“I’ve eaten my fill,” Thorin told Bruffi, and patted his stomach.  “You’re quite safe.”

Bruffi chuckled.  “It’s just—I mean, what do you say?”

Thorin shrugged.  “Tell me about the first time you met Kíli.”

“Oh, okay.” Bruffi glanced at Kíli who rolled his eyes.  “The first time was me reporting in Main Engineering on the Medi, a third year cadet on my starship rotation, and being shoved in front of a console and told by Kíli to tell me when the—“ Bruffi stopped himself from spouting too much technobabble at the Dwarf.  “Well, that part doesn’t matter.  What matters is that he told me he didn’t want to hear anything out of me except when the pressure was over 20 kilopascals.”

“Did he make this face?” Thorin suddenly scowled, his face downward, up at Bruffi.  “Because I’ve perfected that face.”

“Ohh, yeah, he does that a _lot_ better than you, Chief,” Bruffi said, not quite pointing and laughing at the engineer.  

“And the first time you met Fíli?” Thorin asked.

“Not quite the same day.  I’d dislocated my shoulder, sparring with Kat, and we’re in sickbay, and he walks in, takes a look at both of us and says—“

“Why don’t half-naked lads show up on my doorstep when they _haven’t_ ripped themselves to shreds?” Bruffi and Fíli said at the same time, before dissolving into snorting laughter.

“I think Kat was only scandalized a little.  Okay,” Bruffi finally said, standing back up. “I will be by the main entrance if you need me, and at some point, the Captain and First Officer will be along to give their respects.” And with that, Bruffi exited the bedroom.

 

“Am I allowed to stand?” Thorin asked them.

“We want you to take it slowly, you understand,” Fíli cautioned him.  “But yes.  Now will be the best time, before the next round of visitors come.”

Fíli helped Thorin out of the bed, pulling the comforter and sheets back.  In addition to his hospital top, he was wearing matching blue pajama pants that came up to just below his knee.  He was also wearing a pair of woolen socks.  Thorin took a tentative first step and grimaced.”

“What’s wrong?” Kíli asked, concern flashing across his face.

“Just popped my kneecap, that’s all,” Thorin said, taking a deep breath.  “Let’s continue.” 

With a little bit more effort between Thorin and Fíli taking an arm, Thorin took a few ginger steps.  “If you’d like, I could grab you a walking stick,” Fíli offered.  “We both know there’s one around here somewhere.”

Thorin shook his head.  “That will not be necessary.”  Fíli let go of Thorin and the Dwarf made his way to the round window.  Fresh flowers adorned a box on the inside of the window.

He looked out into the green lushness of the Shire outside.  He managed to unlatch the window and stuck his head out and closed his eyes and breathed the fresh air.  He stood there for a moment; Fíli and Kíli let him be.  

“Never thought we’d find ourselves back here,” He murmured.  He picked up a small object that had fallen into the planter box.

It was an acorn, one that had fallen from the tree further up the hill.  Thorin examined the acorn between his thumb and forefinger.

“Here, where trees that were planted were allowed to grow,” Thorin continued.  “And not chopped down.”

Fíli turned to Kíli, and the look between them was dismay.  “Uncle…?”  Kíli called out from the bed.

“Not all of Dwarrow-kind should be trusted with an ax,” Thorin muttered.  “For fear of taking down a tree that did not deserve it.”

Fíli let him alone for the moment and stepped quickly to his brother.

“What was that?” Kíli asked.

“I don’t want to press,” Fíli replied, in hushed tones.  “Dr. Ch’tra will have someone do a psych consult on him.”

“But didn’t it sound like…?” Kíli pressed.

“Kee,” Fíli said, firmly.  “ _Please_ drop this.  I know what it sounded like, but I’d rather he told this to someone that can help him, and that’s not you and me right now.  Right now, we can make him feel as comfortable as we can.  That’s all.  All right?”

 

“Fíli, let’s get me back on the bed,” Thorin said from the window.

“Can you do it?” Fíli asked.  

Fíli was rewarded with a Thorin Look, and smiled.  

Thorin slowly walked himself back to the bed, and Fíli helped him back on top of the sheets.  Kíli took the sandwich tray and very discreetly took all the ginger ale bottles away from the room.  

“We’ll be down the hall,” Fíli told Thorin.  “Rest up for a little while.”

Thorin nodded and Fíli closed the door.

 

***

 

 

The next guest who beamed down was Captain Adam Reid III himself, the commanding officer of the _Mediterranean_ ; he wore his suede jacket with the leather on the shoulders over a grey tunic.  He’d shorn down his sides since the last time Fíli saw him on Luna, the day he introduced him to Stan.  It seemed far longer than a few weeks ago.

“Doctor,” He greeted Fíli.

Fíli gave him a weary glance as he drank his tea.  “When is his ETA?” 

“By tonight,” Adam said.  “After everyone else has come and gone.”

Fíli nodded.  “He’s so much like my uncle,” He said.  “But with all the regrets.  He did something _terrible_ , and he’s torn up about it, and I’m…too scared to ask what.”

Adam sat down, and poured himself a cup from the tea service.  “Well, of course,” Adam answered.  “Then it makes it real; it breaks the spell.”

Kíli stood by the doorway.  “I was told to tell you that deep-dish Sicilian is no problem,” he told Fíli.

“Mahal bless,” Fíli said.  “At least there’s pizza.”

“Does this mean I should hold off on paying my respects?” Adam asked.

Fíli shook his head.  “No.  We’ll keep him distracted.  Who’s doing the psych consult?”

“Frodo declined,” Adam told Fíli.  “But we’ve actually found a Khazad counselor.”

With that, Adam stood up.  “Did you want to…?”

“I’ll be along,” Fíli said, still nursing his tea.  “Kee?”

Kíli nodded and beckoned Adam with a wave.

 

 

“Thorin Oakenshield,” Adam greeted him.  

Thorin squared Adam up, looked him up and down.  “You are the Captain, yes?”

“I am,” Adam replied.  “May I have a seat?”

Thorin gestured toward an armchair in the corner.  Adam picked it up and put it to the left of Thorin.

“Here to pay your respects,” Thorin said.  “Is that it?”

“In part,” Adam agreed.  “Partly to offer support for Fíli and Kíli.”

“Tell me, Captain,” Thorin asked.  “Tell me how you first met them.”

“The first time I’d heard of them, I was in Minas Tirith,” Adam told Thorin, whose eyebrows raised at the mention of the capital of Gondor.  “I was set to part ways with my partner and kin, Joshua, and Gimli Gloin’s son had told him to seek them out back home.”

“You are well-travelled in Middle-earth,” Thorin said.  “For a Terran.”  The way Thorin said ‘Terran’ wasn’t entirely affectionate.

“ _That’s_ a long story,” Adam said.  “Then I read up on their Starfleet files before they were assigned to my team to Limbo—which were both incredibly accomplished and impressive,” Adam added hoping to score points.  Thorin gazed impassively.

“But I met them in person while we were waiting for our transport to Limbo with Joshua, Ms. K’gar and my sister, Joy.  Fíli told me,” And here Adam pursed his lips together as Fíli was known to do and with his best impression said, “‘Two Reids, Two Dwarves’”

At that, Thorin put his hand in front of his mouth and chuckled.  “That…was pretty good.”

As Adam smiled and chuckled back, Thorin noticed his eyes.  “Your eyes.”

Adam’s crystal blue, eagle-eyes.  

Adam’s cheeks flushed and he averted his gaze.  “That’s an even longer story.  Let’s just say that my history with Arda runs deeper than most folks know.”

Thorin said no more on the topic.  “You’ve visited Erebor?  My home?”

Adam nodded.  “Since the Battle of Dale, and what’s being called The Emergence, Erebor, The Iron Hills and Ered Luin have formed a new alliance, and form a substantial faction within the world government.”  Adam grimaced and added, “In fact, they continue to lobby to explore mining prospects in Moria.”

Thorin frowned.  “If what Fíli and Kíli tell me are true, that’s deeply perilous.”

Adam nodded.  “I myself was one of the last people to be within the mountain; that was six years ago.  While that mission did yield a large amount of duranium—what you and yours would know as _mithril_ —I recommended to the Council that Moria remain hands-off.”

“They told me Balin died there,” Thorin said, his mood changing.  “And this world’s Ori, and Óin.  And many others.”

“Yes.” Adam said. “And I’m not saying that there wouldn’t be benefits for the Dwarves—The prospect of finding latinum alone would change the fortunes of all of Dwarrow-kind—but perhaps not without the help of the Corps of Engineers.”

Thorin looked at Adam.  “They trust you.  You’re their Captain.”

“When it comes to Arda, I don’t think of myself of anything but some kid who was given books and lore to study and obsess over,” Adam said, humbly.  

“Nevertheless, you looked after my nephews for a time.  For that I would thank you.”

Adam bowed his head to Thorin.  “They returned the favor as well.  So likewise.”  With that, Adam got up.  “I’ll take my leave of you.”

As he got up to leave the bedroom Thorin called after him.  “Please wait.”

Adam looked over his shoulder.  “Yes, sir?”

“When will the…Master of Bag End be arriving?”

Adam smiled.  “When the party is over.”


	3. I Want To Know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Commander Buffi K'gar coaxes Thorin out of the bedroom.

And so, over the course of the afternoon, Bag End was visited by Bifur and Bombur, who had two carts of deep dish pizza beamed over from Erebor’s kitchens.  Bifur was too emotional to speak; he used the Khazad gestural language to convey his gratitude that Thorin was alive.  Fíli noticed that, along with Bifur’s hair having turned entirely white, even the scarring of his old injury had been healed by modern medicine.  Bombur told him that along with his own health-related treatments (The Dwarrow was down to 90 kilograms, praise Mahal) Bifur was getting a cortical treatment in the fall.  Though he had his moments of clarity, the damage to his language center had always seemed to come up time and again.

Bofur and Nori arrived together shortly after that.  While they were present when Thorin’s stasis chamber had been transferred from the other universe, they hadn’t seen him up and aware until now.  Kíli never thought he would see the day that Nori’s thievery would have given them such a boon.  

Bofur was still proud of the fact that he had negotiated a mining agreement with the nearby Bed-Lama system.  “In fact,” he told Kíli and Bombur and anyone else within earshot, “We have preliminary mining ships setting up platforms as we speak.  And I’m confident that we’ll find dilithium deposits by year’s end.”

Bombur grinned at that.  After all, he’d been the one to design the mining platforms.

 

Kíli wandered back to the sitting room where Fíli sat speaking with a returned Ori. The two were leaned in toward the coffee table in the center where a antique tea service was newly stocked.  He thought he could smell faint traces of chamomile.

 

“I see,” Fíli sighed.

“It was a surprise to us all at the time,” Ori replied, “But in hindsight…”

 

“How terrible.  Terrible!” a voice that Kíli immediately recognized as Dori exclaimed.  “What a tragic set of circumstances!  And to think, it could have happened in our own universe as well, if not for—“

Dori didn’t finish his thought, and instead wrapped his thick arms back around Ori, who squeaked at the strong embrace.  Ori didn’t seem to mind, though.

Kíli glanced at Fíli who nodded at him.  Confirming the engineer’s initial concerns about Thorin.  

“So what do we do?” Kíli asked.

Fíli stood up.  He looked at them.  “To honor the memory of our departed King, I will help this Dwarrow.  I will stand by him.  I have no illusions that he is entirely the same as my Uncle, but I will stand by him.”

Kíli smiled.  “As will I.”

“Ive seen many versions of ourselves in the Multiverse,” Ori told Fíli and Kíli.  “Versions that are virtually unrecognizable, where we are Terran, different species, different genders, different timelines…But this remains the same.  I knew this reality was well-chosen.  Thank you both so much.”

Ori broke the grasp of Dori and hugged them both at once.  He then took another piece of pizza and munched into it with gusto.  “Bombur and pizza, though— _that’s_ new!”

“Not many alternate universes where Dwarrow-men and Turtle-lads interact, is there?” Kíli asked with a scoff.

“N-nope,” Ori replied, and took another, bigger bite.

 

Thorin dozed in the bedroom through it all, though Fíli and Dr. Ch’Tra popped in now and then to track his vitals.  

 

A few other visitors showed up as well.

 

However, the boisterous entrance of Glóin, his son Gimli, and his granddaughter Doeli roused Thorin up finally, as the moon came into view in the window and afternoon began to wane.  

“Alternate universes!  Medical Stasis!  These Terrans use their gobbldygook speech to ruin even the best of miracles!”  Gimli exclaimed.  Over the years, his aversion to technical speech had gotten more and more pronounced.  Kíli, who was fluent in Starfleet technobabble, rolled his eyes.

_Adad_ , I was in the room when his box appeared, you know,” Doeli reminded her father.  “Popped into our reality—pop!—just like that.”

“ _Not_ quite like that,” Kíli reminded her.  “We had to do quite a bit of running around in Limbo to get back here.”

“Hullo Chief!” Doeli greeted Kíli, before spying Ori.  “Oh…Master Ori.  No hard feelings?”  Doeli was the one that knocked the wind out of Ori on Bed-Lama when he orchestrated a bit of mayhem to try to get away from Limbo.

“Oh, no.  None.  That’s quite the weapon you had,” He told her, and took her hands into his own.  

 

From his bedroom, Thorin sat himself up.

“Glóin has a granddaughter,” Thorin sighed.  “And she’s in Starfleet.”

 

“Yes,” Thranduil said.  His transition from sitting perfectly still in the armchair to suddenly speaking was jarring.  “Many of our kind have begun the pilgrimage to Terra to study.”

“Why are you _here_?” Thorin asked.  

“I am not entirely sure,” The King of Greenwood said.  “Rivendell has received a similar guest, who arrived in a similar manner from Romulus.  _Romulans_ ,” Thranduil said with barely contained contempt.  

“Aye,”  Thorin agreed.

“Why do you not join their revels?” Thranduil asked.  “This is all for your benefit.”

Thorin scoffed.  “No.  This is for the benefit of a dead Dwarrow.  _Their_ dead Dwarrow.  I am but a…”

“A cuckoo,” Thranduil suggested.

Thorin turned to look at the High Elf, a quizzical look on his quickly scowling face.

“They often place their eggs in other birds’ nests, and their young is raised by the host nest,” Thranduil explained.  “But regardless, you are here.”

“You are uncannily more affable than the Elven King from my own reality,” Thorin observed.  

“Indeed,” Thranduil said.  “We are only met tonight; any quarrels I had with this reality’s Thorin Oakenshield died with him eighty-odd years ago.  We are free of course,” Thranduil said pointedly, “To begin new quarrels.”

“Perhaps some other time,” Thorin suggested.

 

He was interrupted by the sound of someone clearing their throat.

 

Thorin looked at the door entrance and saw another Cainian in a Starfleet uniform.  She wore her hair back and it was honey blonde.  Like Ensign K’gar she had a hound-like snout, and her muzzle had long whiskers.  

 

“You’re not supposed to be in here without escort,” She addressed Thranduil.  “Technically, you’re supposed to be in Rivendell, but we can let that slide.”

The King of Greenwood stood up to his full height, but the Cainian woman stepped right up to him.  “Out,” she told him.  “Or I’m staying put to make sure you play nice.”

Thorin was amazed to see anyone stand toe-to-toe with Thranduil.  

“Madam _Diablador_ ,” He said at last.  “Your mother will hear of this.”  With that he stalked out.

“Bye,” she said after him, before turning back to Thorin.  “The maturity of the High Elves,” She scoffed.  “Comes down to tattling on me to my _mommy_.”

“You are Bruffi’s sister,” Thorin surmised.  

“I am,” Buffi K’gar confirmed.  “I’m also the First Officer of the Medi.  I just finished my shift and came down to pay my respects.”

She sat down upon the side of the bed.  “Speaking of my mother, she’s authorized me to invite you to her hospitality at the Cainian Consulate on Earth,” She told Thorin.  “She does so at the behest of the Lady Dís.”

“My…sister?” Thorin asked.

“Yes.  Apparently, the two of them are friends,” Buffi said.  She put a hand upon Thorin’s arm.  “I’d like the two of us to be friends as well.”

Thorin looked at her suspiciously.  “And why is that, Madam?”

Buffi smiled warmly, and replied,  “Because we share at least one friend in common.”

Thorin said nothing.  He stared at his hands in his lap.

“He’s a well-read author these days,” Buffi said.  “Mostly travelogues to places that most of us take for granted, but he always seems to look at the quadrant with entirely new eyes.  He made Ohio feel interesting, believe it or not.”

“Oh…hai…O?” Thorin sounded the word out.

She waved her free hand.  “It’s an area of Earth that Captain Reid’s from.  The point is…” Buffi continued.  “He’s never in the same place twice.  He’s always traveling and always writing.”

“This doesn’t sound entirely like the same individual I knew,” Thorin said.  “He was determined to remain a homebody with his books and his…armchair over there.”

Buffi got up and plucked a book from the shelf Thorin pointed at.  She placed it by him and sat back down.  Thorin looked at the gilded letters on the leather-bound book.  

 

Here, There, Everywhere

 

A Halfling’s guide to the Alpha Quadrant.

 

“Oh, and look, there’s photographs in these sections,” Buffi pointed out.  

 

And there he was, grinning like mad, in Wayne County, Ohio, in a field full of dairy cows.

In the Mississippi Delta, trying to reel in a gigantic catfish.

In Vulcan’s Forge, with a towel wrapped around his head, giving two thumbs-up.

Wrapped up in a parka on Andor, snow blowing everywhere.

 

Thorin put the book down.  “Just one adventure after another,” He said.

 

Outside, Thorin and Buffi could hear someone begin to pick at what sounded like a guitar.  

“I think this is the musical section of the party,” Buffi said, grinning.  Thorin noticed that while her large canines were displayed, it was still friendly.  

“Who is playing?” He asked.  “It sounds like a lute.”

“It’s a guitar, so I suppose it’s Kíli,” Buffi replied.  “Fíli still plays the violin.”

Thorin nodded his approval.  

 

“Are you gonna keep picking and grinning are you gonna play something?” a voice that Thorin had not yet recognized called out.

“Well?” Buffi asked.  “You gonna join the party?  There’s pizza out there waiting for you.”

“I want to hear Kíli play,” Thorin said.  

Buffi opened the door and Thorin slowly padded over on his stocking feet.  There, he could see them almost all of them: Dori, Nori, and his Ori;  Bifur and Bofur and Bombur holding some strange round dish of food;  Gloin and his son Gimli, whose beard had grown almost as spectacularly as his father’s. and the young Dwarrowdam with dark hair and a short goatee that Thorin supposed was Doeli.  They were all gathered around where Fíli and Kíli were.  Fíli had a device that he was playing like a harpsichord, while Kíli was playing a device that barely looked like an instrument.  

Then there was the elf.

Tall, fiery red hair, and her expression was equal parts love, happiness, and profound sadness.

Kíli began to sing.

 

_You're alone in the rain_

_Been thinking of you_

_You can't stop your tears_

_When you stayed with me just before_

_I want to know_

_Do you love me?_

 

_How long you had to wait for me_

_You can't think of yesterday_

_I got in a fight_

_When you saw me_

_But I couldn't talk and sprawled out on the floor_

_So it's too late_

 

Thorin knew why the Elf-lass was sad.  Tears came to his own eyes as her hand rested on Kíli’s shoulder.

 

_Oh Girl, How can I speak with you_

_If you could hear my secret_

_Now I really want to talk_

_It's a shame_

_Oh, Did you know_

_A way that you can find what you seek_

_You'll be stronger for real_

 

“Oh, lad, that’s too sad a song to be a love song,” Gimli protested, wiping his eyes.  

“But you _need_ sadness in a love story,” the voice of the man Thorin didn’t recognize protested.  He was stout and had short-cropped blond hair, and a lantern jaw. He was dressed in the same uniform as Reid and Buffi K’gar.  “You need it just before the happy ending.”

“And there _was_ a happy ending,” Kíli said.  “But with all good things we had to earn it, didn’t we, love?”

“We searched across a continent on a foreign world for it,” the Elf—was her name Tauriel?—replied.

Kíli adjusted his instrument, and lifted his head up.  “All right, lads, I’m going to need a good hum out of you.”

One by one, the Company gave forth a guttural hum that resonated in the hall of Bag End.  Buffi closed her eyes and her whiskers flickered.  Thorin did the same.

 

And Kíli began a more upbeat song about calling a place called America and everyone’s spirits were much more higher with handclaps all around.  Buffi left Thorin’s side and came back with a plate of what Thorin supposed was pizza.  It was a piece of soft bread with sauce, cheese, mushrooms and green peppers on top.  Thorin took a bite.  Then he took an even bigger bite.  

“This is even better than the sandwiches!” he exclaimed.  

“Welcome back to the world,”  Buffi said.  

“Your captain,” Thorin said, between bites, “Confided that though he’s wandered through much of Middle-earth, he felt himself to be a child learning his lessons.  What of you?”

 

Buffi looked far away for a moment, and for a time, Thorin thought he could hear more of that piano music in a gentle wave of arpeggios.  

“Do you remember,” Buffi said softly.  “Do you remember the first time you visited the Shire?”

Thorin did, and he nodded.  The lush green of the hills, the folks content to work the land and to visit amongst themselves.  He envied their simple lives and their simple desires to enjoy life.

“I spent most of my life in cities,” Buffi explained.  “My mother worked at the Consulate on Manhattan Island, while my father was off on his expeditions.  We didn’t actually live in the House of K’gar.”  

Thorin didn’t ask her to clarify what that meant, though he believed he understood the context.  “I see.”

“And while my first taste of Middle-earth was being led by the Steward of Gondor through Minas Tirith and looking out at all they had built, I will always— _always_ —remember those green hills, and those little people so happy with their work.  That and the acorns.”  Buffi added.

“Hmm?” Thorin jerked his head away from the pizza.

Buffi dismissed her thoughts with a wave.  “That’s a silly little story, neither here nor there.”

They stood there quietly for a little while longer, before Thorin asked Buffi, “You don’t have to stand guard over me.  Please enjoy this gathering.”

“It’s fine,” Buffi said.  “I want to.  You’re not what I expected.”

“No?” Thorin asked.  “No, I suppose not.  I do have a bit of a reputation.”

“Ehh.  So do I,” Buffi replied.  “People change.  The people in our lives change us.”

“Who were you, then, Ms. K’gar?” Thorin asked.  “And who changed you?”

 

Buffi looked at Thorin and grimaced.  “I was a hurt and angry young woman who took that hurt out on the world.  I turned my pain into self-righteousness and built a tower around myself that no one could climb or enter.  Not even Galadriel herself could see my heart, I’d protected it that well.”

Thorin took Buffi’s hand into his and patted the top of it with his other hand.  “I know that tower well.”

“I let a man love me and he was taken away.  I let myself love another man and he betrayed and abused me and my trust.  And so I built that tower.  And while I worked with the Reids, I let the tower come down slowly.  I let people in—mostly people with the last name of Baggins—and I found a mission.”

“Those Bagginses,” Thorin murmured.  

“And one day…my man came back,” Buffi continued.  “And, you know, it wasn’t happily ever after, but…we got there.”

“Happily ever after until the end of your days,” Thorin replied, “Is the rarest of endings.”

“Someone once told me,” Buffi retorted, “That there are no such things as happy endings, because nothing really _ends_.”

“Some things do,” Thorin replied.  “Some things _have_ to end.”

“Come on,” Buffi said, extending her hand back to Thorin.  “They’d all like you to join them.”

There was a time that Thorin Oakenshield would just as soon hack the hand off of someone who looked like Buffi K’gar as take it in friendship.  But the kindness that she and the other strangers had shown him along with these same-but-different kin and friends were keeping him afloat in unfamiliar seas.  Even as he took Buffi’s hand and let himself be led, he didn’t feel like his feet were quite reaching the floor, that a wave was about to crash into him, leaving him lost forever.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song List:
> 
> "I want to know" --Benjamin Anderson (Kill la Kill soundtrack)  
> "Calling America"--Electric Light Orchestra  
> "Eternity ~Memories of Lightwaves~ Noriko Matsueda and Takahito Eguchi (Final Fantasy X-2 Soundtrack)


	4. Dust Off Your Highest Hopes

Fíli looked on as Buffi led Thorin toward the Company.  Kíli looked unsure, even as Tory held his hand in support.  

“What’s gonna happen next?” Joshua Reid-LeBeau—The Starfleet officer that Thorin had spied before—said behind him.  The former captain of the _USS Tomcat_ had dropped in around the same time that Buffi had.  

“ _Amad_ will want to keep him in Erebor, or at least Ered Luin,” Fíli sighed.  “I’d prefer to keep him where I can keep an eye on him, at least at first.”

Josh circled over to land in a chair nearby to Fíli. “In San Francisco?” he asked.

Fíli nodded.  

“Well,” Josh said, “If he does end up on Earth, make sure you two swing by the restaurant in New Orleans.”

“If Thorin likes pizza, then he’ll certainly like Cajun,” Fíli replied with a chuckle.  

“Cajun cuisine won the War of the Ring,” Josh declared.  “The hist’ry books won’t tell you that, but I was there.”

“While we’re on the subject, where’s Dr. Pines?” Fíli asked Josh.

Josh straightened.  “He’s still in Rivendell, being an enormous nerd,” he said.  “Probably straining Elrond’s hospitality to its limits.”

Fíli smiled and shook his head.  “Thirteen filthy dwarves stripped naked and bathing in an ancient elvish fountain,” He told Josh, whose grin got wider and wider.  “Trust me, Dr. Science couldn’t strain any limits if he _tried_.”

“It’s just as well; Elrond’s concern is with conferring with Vice-Proconsul M’ret,” Josh explained.  “They’re discussing a sort of means to bring more Romulan dissidents across to Arda as well as Vulcan.”

“Like an underground railroad?” Fíli asked.

Josh nodded.  “The Vulcan way doesn’t appeal to the entire dissident movement, so living amongst the Quendi is a legitimate alternative.”

Fíli frowned. “No wonder Thranduil had that look.  He’s always disagreed with Elrond concerning exploring relations with the Romulans _or_ Vulcans.  He paused, and stuck Josh with a look.  “And what about _you_ , youngster?” he asked Josh.  “You’re kind of adrift since you were reassigned— _de_ assigned?—from the _Tomcat_.  When are you getting another command?”

“It’s sketchy,” Josh admitted. “Just got told to stand by for further instructions.  Until then, I’m on leave.”

“With this and the _Medi_ getting decommissioned—It makes one wonder if your Initiative is receiving pushback from the brass,” Fíli said conspiratorially.  “Where is our Wizard when we need him?”

“I think you know better than to ask that question,” Josh scoffed.  “Besides, it gives me a chance to catch up on old friends ‘round here.”

“Like chatting up the wife of the Prince of Ithilien,” Fíli chuckled.  “I think I need to put the three of you in a room.”

“That’s your solution to everything!” Josh exclaimed.

“And it keeps on working!” Fíli replied, bursting into laughter.

 

***

 

Buffi waded through the gathering of Dwarves, with Thorin in gentle tow, still holding her hand.  She first got to know them through prose, through Bilbo Baggins’ words describing them all.  Not quite as detailed as she would have liked.  Dori’s fussiness.  Bombur’s shy, almost mute demeanor.  Bofur’s gregariousness.  Bifur’s gentle hands.  All these she learned for herself, from her service with Fíli and Kíli, and also through her participation in their Reunion.

But Bilbo made it very clear about Thorin Oakenshield.  His nobility shone through, even when it was wrongheaded and stubborn.  

Each member of the Company, to Buffi’s surprise and satisfaction, were nothing but respectful of Thorin’s slightly fragile nature.  They bowed low to him and kept their hands to their sides, murmuring their greetings.  When it came to Thorin Oakenshield, he inspired class.  

 

Oddly enough, the moment made her miss Raphael.  Not always one with the class, she admitted, but she loved her man for an entirely different set of reasons.  Buffi admired a man with passion, and a willingness to push back against her own willful personality.  

It made her wonder, sometimes; _was_ conflict truly the path to love?

She looked down at Thorin, and smiled.  Maybe it was, for some people.  She hoped to see Bilbo before the party ended and she had to get some sleep for her next shift up on the _Medi_.  She hadn’t seen him in person since the Olympics on Betazed. and that was almost eighteen months ago.

“Commander,” Thorin tugged at Buffi’s hand.  “I’ll take my hand, back, thank you.”  With that, Thorin turned to speak to Dori, who nodded tearfully, yet respectably, speaking about something Buffi couldn’t quite make out.  Probably something about tea.  

“Babe.”

Buffi turned to find Raphael in front of her, as if he’d popped out of thin air.  He quickly grabbed her hand.  She slumped into his shoulder, her other arm slung over onto his shell.  The moment couldn’t last long enough, but she tried.

“So glad to see you,” she sighed.  

“Likewise,” Raph replied.  “Leo’s having a mini-meltdown because he can’t get down here soon enough.”

“He can catch up with Gimli at the end of his shift, and he can get over it,” Buffi sighed.  “Everyone here’s heard all their war stories anyway—well, except for…”

“Oh, yeah,” Raphael said, looking on as Thorin was nodding as Bofur was telling him something, using his arms for emphasis.  “How’s _he_ doing?”

“Thorin Oakenshield was bold, insistent, obstinate at times.  He held the same distrust of Elves that the rest of his people held at that time,” Buffi explained.  “He had the goal of killing Smaug and reclaiming the Lonely Mountain for his people and his family.  And, despite a few struggles and the curse of dragon’s gold, he succeeded, though he didn’t live to see what he’d accomplished.”

“But this Thorin did?” Raph asked.  “From the other universe.”

Buffi placed a finger on Raph’s moss-green cheek.  “He died some five years after, but he survived that battle.”

“We don’t talk about that other universe,” Raph noted.  “Either one of them.  We probably _should_ , someday.”

“There’s a lot of things that we need to talk about someday about the last year,” Buffi admitted.  “Celtris III.  Gul Madred.  Damar, yet _again_ …”

“Not tonight?” Raph interrupted, half-asking.

Buffi shook her head.  “No.  Not tonight.  I’m just glad we were able to get someone home.”

“Well, home is wherever _you_ are,” Raph told her, and held her tightly.

Buffi soon felt a tug at her pant leg, and the two disengaged to find Bifur standing before them both.  He signed at them, gesturing with hands that came together tightly, and he blew them a kiss.

“He means to say,” Bombur said, in a rare public display of speech, “That he hopes that everyone gets as happy an ending as the two of you.”

Buffi put a hand to her heart.  “That is so sweet.  You all are the best.”

Bombur smiled and toddled along toward Thorin, Bifur just a bit ahead.

 

 

Buffi spied Josh chatting with Fíli and broke contact with Raphael.  He followed her into the sitting room and snatched herself up a cup of Dori’s tea.  

“I’m pondering staying up later so I can be here when Bilbo is,” Buffi said.  “Frodo told me that he’s terrified, though.”

“Those two in a room, after all this time,” Fíli said.  “Sort of.  I keep wanting to forget that Thorin is from another reality.”

“Maybe it’s better if we don’t,” Buffi said.  “I mean, he’s the one that was saved, right?  Everything else the same, except instead of you two in stasis, it was him?”

Fíli and Josh glanced at each other, then back to her.  It made her stomach sink.

“What?” Buffi asked.  

“Buffi, love,” Fíli began, “There’s a good deal of evidence that the injuries that mortally wounded Thorin over there were…were self-inflicted.”

Buffi looked over her shoulders to Thorin, now on his third piece of pizza and speaking with Raphael and Gimli both (Probably about Leonardo, if Buffi’s guess was correct) and while Thorin was smiling all the while, it didn’t quite go all the way to his eyes.

“No,” she sighed.  “That’s why Ch’tra wanted the counselor for him.”

Fíli nodded.  “We haven’t pressed.  We’ve simply attempted to make him comfortable for now.”

“And when Bilbo arrives?” Buffi asked.  “How do you know you’re not making a bad situation worse?”

“Play it by ear, I suppose,” Fíli muttered.  

“I’m not gonna get _any_ sleep,” Buffi sighed.  “I wonder if Aldor will switch me a shift…”

Josh chuckled.  “You and Adam, and Frodo might want to have some coffee tomorrow,” he suggested.  

Buffi threw her hands up and rolled her eyes.  “There’s a lot of people here who are emotionally invested in these two little guys, isn’t there?”

Fíli hunched up his shoulders and looked off to the side.  “We-eeeellll…”

Buffi stuck Fíli with a look of sudden realization.  “Bilbo never wrote anything like—Fíli, did anything romantic ever happen between Bilbo and Thorin?”

“Technically…?” Fíli asked rhetorically.

“ _Fíli_ …!” Buffi exclaimed.  “Come on!”

“Did we catch the two of them snogging?  No.  But there was more than a bit of sexual tension between Thorin being unimpressed with ‘The Hobbit’ or ‘Burglar Baggins’ to the…the Rampart… _oh_.”

Buffi cocked her head.  “Rampart?”

Fíli waved the question away.  “Never mind me.  I was just remembering a bit of nasty business…I _hope_ that wasn’t…ohhh.”  Fíli’s complexion had begun to pale slightly, even in the low light of Bag End.  

Josh noticed as much.  “You okay, doc?” He asked.  “You don’t look so hot.”

“I think I need some pizza,” Fíli said, and got up suddenly, leaving Josh and Buffi by themselves.”

“Rampart,” Buffi murmured.  “I think I need to grab some reading material.”

She made her way back to the guest bedroom while Josh went and rejoined the party.

He sidled alongside Raphael and Thorin and bowed slightly to him.  “Joshua Maurice Reid, at’cher service,” He greeted Thorin.  

“The other Reid,” Thorin said.  “The rogue Captain, according to some.”

“So they say,” Josh conceded.  “However, until such time as I get a new command, I feel privileged to reflect and to choose a new direction and to get more people on board with something we’re calling the Initiative.”

Thorin raised one eyebrow.  “Does this include the dwarves in this Company?”

“It does.  I was hoping, in fact, to speak with Dwalin on this tonight, but it seems he has other plans for the moment.  I hear he’ll be along tomorrow, however.”

“It’s his Company to lead, and I’ll not question nor challenge his judgement for now,” Thorin said.  “But please indulge me.”

 

“When I was thirteen years old,” Josh went on to say, “I learned that a part of my heredity—my DNA—held something extra.  It gave me a gift and a power that I needed to learn to control.”  With that, he held up his hand and showed Thorin as it began to glow with a warm orange-yellow light.  Thorin looked at it like a moth to a flame.  As Josh began to speak again, his hand extinguished. “I also was taught the ethics of using an extra power for the betterment of all, instead of my own selfish impulses.  As such, I found myself in a unique position on Arda when its peoples were at war against Sauron.”

Thorin nodded in understanding.

“And when you have an extra ability, you tend to find others who are similarly gifted.  Whether they’re gifted with ancient SilverHawk armor, or training or knowledge, or like you, with unique circumstances, you find one another out.  And you make a choice, whether to work together or not.  We’ve been lucky here in the Alpha Quadrant that most of us want to make a difference in the greater good.  But not everyone.”

“‘With great power comes great responsibility,’ Cap?” Raphael interjected.

“Just because it comes from a holo-comic doesn’t make it any less valid, Mr. Hamato,” Josh chided.  

“So this…Initiative,” Thorin surmised, “Is a program to…seek out those like you, throughout this Quadrant?” 

“That, and getting them in touch with everyone else.  When the next Borg attack happens, when things start bubbling up over on the Cardassian border, if the Klingons have another political reversal, whatever…Nobody should feel like they’re alone.”

“And you’ll do this through your Star Fleet,” Thorin said.”

“Partly,” Josh explained.  “It’s…complicated, and it has mostly to do with Starfleet’s stance on genetically enhanced citizens.  Not everyone with powers was born with them.” Josh now had a shameful look on his face.  “Sometimes parents take their kids in for…repairs.”

Thorin looked horrified.  “Unsatisfied with their own children!?  That is barbaric!”

“And if something—anything—goes awry, then you end up making things worse.  At SAGR, I knew a girl named Sarina who was—“ Josh stopped himself.  “Anyway I’m going off course.  Starfleet knows I’m not augmented but was born with latent powers.  It’s a technicality as far as they’re concerned.

“Now, in the civilian realm, there’s folks who are out there with extraordinary circumstances, who are just as willing to do good.  “We find them throughout the Federation, but they feel like they’re alone in fighting whatever they’re fighting.  So why should they?  Circumstances brought all of us on the _Medi_ together—well, circumstances and Gandalf—but we’re on a ship going where we’re told.  Once we leave, so does the help.  That’s not right.”  Josh’s face was animated as he continued his pitch to Thorin.  “We want to set up a network where these folks can contact others on the fly to pitch in.  So that a fella from Dimorus doesn’t have to trick us into helping us with his planet’s corruption.  So that a trans-dimensional invasion doesn’t try to kidnap a planet before anyone realizes.” Josh chuckled.  “And that doesn’t even count the possibility of eldritch abominations that try to enslave planets.”

“As they do,” Thorin dryly replied.  “Right.  So, this is, perhaps your attempt at a…league…of justice?”

Raphael cleared his throat loudly.  Joshua turned and sent him a contentious glare.  “Now, what I want to discuss with Dwalin would involve something that he’s been suggesting to your cousin and namesake over yonder.  The Company, give or take, has influence, both in industry and finance, but in politics among the Khazad.”  Josh leaned in and added, “They just look like a bunch of silly beards, but they pack quite a punch.”

Josh watched as Thorin’s chest visibly puffed out in pride.  “As they should,” Thorin replied.

“Arda’s role in the Federation hasn’t been sussed out yet,” Joshua explained.  “They’ve only recently gained membership, but they’ve managed to maintain a kind of autonomy in the construction of their star vessels.”

“The Elves keep their own ships, no doubt,” Thorin grumbled.  

Josh nodded.  “Right.  That’s something that Dwalin wants to take advantage of.  You see, there’s more than a few shipbuilders among the Khazad as well.”

Thorin snuck a sly glance over at Kíli.  “So I hear.”

Josh was about to elaborate further when a female voice shouted down the hall: 

 

_“NO. WAY!”_

 

Buffi stalked down the hall, her canines exposed, her whiskers standing on end.  The dwarves parted left and right as she returned to the party.  She spotted Thorin and before Josh knew it, she was upon him.  Her hands clenched and unclenched.  

Thorin’s expression was one of resignation.  He didn’t meet her intense, green-eyed gaze.  There wasn’t true hatred there, but it bore into the Dwarf.

“I’m…so sorry,” She finally said.  “I want to be mad at you, but I can’t.  It all makes sense now.  Raphael,” She held her hand out and Raph clutched it firmly.  “Let’s go.

“Yeah, baby, come on,” Raph replied, and led her out of the sudden throng of dwarves gathering around the commotion.  They could hear her snuffling as they beamed up from the parlor.

Thorin stood there, once again lost at sea.  He sought out Fíli, who took his hand.  “I wish to go back to the bedroom.  I…am grateful for all your hospitality and hope to speak with you all soon,” he addressed the partiers.  

Fíli nodded and glanced backward to Kíli and Josh as he walked Thorin back to his bed.

Josh glanced at Kíli who looked as lost as Thorin.  Tauriel put her hands on his shoulders in reassurance.  

“Nasty business on a rampart, Kee?” Josh asked him.

Kíli’s eyes widened.  “Ohhh, no,” he breathed.  “That’s must have been…” 

Tauriel spoke up.  “Did they not tell you of the events regarding the Battle of the Five Armies?” 

Josh’s eyelids fluttered in frustration.  “I got dribs and drabs of it, but maybe not enough.  There was a conflict between your King, Thorin and the Lake-town, and then the Orcs showed up and then all hell broke loose.”

Tauriel was about to explain when Kíli put his hand over hers, still on his shoulder.  He shook his head.  “Captain Reid-LeBeau needs to attend to Dr. Pines, love.  This party is but over.  But rest assured, there is a tale to tell, as upsetting as it may be.”

Slowly but surely, the Company guests were beamed back to their mountain homes, leaving Fíli, Kíli and Rose alone with Josh, who himself had places to go.  “Let me know how this ends,” he told them as he beamed away.  

The three sat in the sitting room once again.  Rose sent Goldie and Ellie back hours ago to their quarters on the Medi, and the silence was almost stifling.  Fíli kept looking down the hall to Thorin’s quiet room.  

“Um, doc?” Bruffi peered around the doorway.  They’d all forgotten that the young Cainian officer was still posted at the door.

“Eh?” Fíli said, distractedly. It had been a long day, and he was starting to feel the effects of fatigue.  

“Guest of honor’s here.”  And with that, Bruffi was gone leaving someone that Fíli hadn’t himself seen since the Olympics. 

“Doctor!” Bilbo Baggins, Esquire, didn’t bother staying by the doorway as he moved his furry hobbit feet toward the two dwarves.  Fíli hugged Bilbo tightly and squeezed his eyes shut, and they stayed that way for more than a moment. 

Fíli looked down at Bilbo.  He looked a bit older than when he first met him, but far younger than his one hundred forty years.  He wore a hybrid of traditional hobbit wear with off-world patterns.  He wore his curly hair long, tied back.

“You look dreadfully tired,” Bilbo noted.  

“I _am_ dreadfully tired,” Fíli replied and chuckled.  “And you?”

“He’s down the hall, in one of the guest bedrooms?” Bilbo inquired.

Fíli nodded.

“I…”  Bilbo sighed. “I shall resolve to speak with him in the morning.”

Fíli smiled, but it faded.  Kíli looked on as well.  

 

“Bilbo…before we go, there are some things about the man in your guest bedroom that you need to know.”

 


	5. Everything Stays

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo cleans house.

He found himself in a nice, warm bed.

 

He’d slept through the night, Thorin realized.  The sun once again shone through the window.  

No Dr. Ch’tra this time.  Instead, Thorin could hear the faint sound of humming.  

Someone was humming somewhere in Bag End.  

Thorin sat himself up, put a pillow to prop himself up, and sighed.  

Now Thorin could hear singing.  Despite himself, he smiled.  

“ _Let’s go in the garden_ ,” The voice sang.

 

“Hello?” Thorin called out.

 

“Oh, we’re awake!” the voice answered.  “Fancy some breakfast?”

“Of course,” Thorin replied.  

“Good!”  And there he was, Bilbo Baggins, one-time burglar, and, according to Buffi K’gar, now a galactic bon vivant, With a bed tray filled with capers, sausages, and eggs, along with a carafe of juice.  

“There’s, eh, coffee brewing, if you like,” Bilbo said, putting the tray in front of Thorin. 

Thorin nodded.  

“So!” Bilbo began.  “You’re my houseguest, then?”

“I suppose,” Thorin replied.  “You had me come here when they revived me.”

“I’ve visited your sister in the Ered Luin,” Bilbo said.  “It’s a lovely place to stay, but a dreadful place to find oneself when coming back from the dead.”  Bilbo looked over his shoulder, and glanced back at Thorin.  “And a hobbit’s home is made for comfort.”

“Yes.” Thorin said.  

“So there you go, then!” Bilbo said, smiling.  However Thorin noticed that the smile didn’t entirely reach his eyes.  

“Will…will Dr. Ch’tra be coming back to check on me?” Thorin asked.  

“The good doctor will be along to check your vitals, as will your nephew,” Bilbo answered.  “Probably as soon as your sister and her husband arrive.”

“She’s remarried?” Thorin asked.  

“That’s for her to explain,” Bilbo said, waving the subject away.  “But don’t worry.  He’s a fine chap.”

Thorin ate the breakfast silently while Bilbo watched him.  Now the smile was gone from Bilbo entirely.

“Your scar,” Bilbo said, absently touching the bridge of his own nose.  “It’s the same injury.”

Thorin glanced at Bilbo.  “It seems that we are very much alike, your Thorin and myself.”

“Yes, it would seem,”Bilbo agreed, nodding his head.  “Little differences, here and there.”  Bilbo circled the bed, while Thorin continued to eat.  “It’s a bit dangerous, you know?  Second-guessing your choices in life.”

Thorin looked up at Bilbo, but said nothing.  

Bilbo continued puttering around the room, clucking his tongue at the books that Buffi had left out the night before and re-shelved them.  “She never puts my books away, never mind that she has every single sentence I ever published,” Bilbo explained as he went.  

“She was showing me,” Thorin said.  “Showing me pictures of you.”

Bilbo chuckled.  “Was it the cows?  She can’t get enough of the dairy farm story.”

Thorin smiled warmly.  The picture of Bilbo in the field of dairy cattle was endearing, to say the least.  Then as soon as it started, the smile faded again.  

Bilbo moved the armchair back over to the bed and grabbed his own breakfast plate and began to tuck in.    

Thorin looked at Bilbo as he ate and mused, “I always wondered how you managed to put it all away.”

“Hobbit appetite, I suppose,” Bilbo said, wiping his mouth with a napkin.  “Accelerated physiology and all that.”  Bilbo paused for a moment.  “I’ve seen you put a meal away quite heartily yourself, if I recall.”

Thorin shrugged.  It wasn’t that way the last time Thorin recalled—not that he wanted to recall those last days.  

Before he knew it, his hands were being held by Bilbo’s.  “It’s going to be all right,” Bilbo told him.  “We’re here, together, and we will get you better.”

“You are too kind, B—Master Baggins,” Thorin said.  He stared at his glass of juice.

“I realize we—you and I—we don’t truly know the other,” Bilbo said.  “This alternate universe business, quite frankly makes me go cross-eyed if I think about it too much.  So can we forget about it?  You can be my Thorin, and I could be your Bilbo, if you’d like.”

Thorin looked at Bilbo, with a look of near-horror, and took his hands away from Bilbo.  

Bilbo looked stricken for a moment, but recovered quickly.  “So tell me, Master Dwarf.  How do you know me?  Him. Me.  Damn,” Bilbo cursed. 

Thorin didn’t speak. 

Bilbo continued on.  “The last time I spoke to you, you tried to apologize to me,” Bilbo said quietly.  “You weren’t yourself, you see.  The dragon-sickness, and the Arkenstone business—It was intense.  But then you fell at Ravenhill, and I was there…to see you off.”  Bilbo wiped his eyes.  “By the Lady, that was so long ago, and so much has happened.  I don’t even feel like the same Bilbo myself.”

“You’re the Bilbo who went to the Terran Homeworld,” Thorin said.  “To Vulcan.  Tell me, did you manage to get to Qo’NoS?”

Bilbo sighed and chuckled.  “No, not quite.  There was that nasty business with the Civil War a couple years ago.  Some of the youngsters brought a souvenir back, however.”  

Thorin’s eyes widened as Bilbo gestured toward the hallway.  It was much smaller than one made for a grown Klingon, but all the same, a miniature _bat’leth_ hung on Bilbo’s wall in the hall.

He got up, brushed the crumbs off of his lap, and walked back to the doorway.  “I’ve got to get this place in living condition for the Gamgees—they’re the ones that live here now—the next time they get back home.  You’re welcome to get up and help me, if you’d like.

Thorin shrugged and got himself out of bed.  He found that he was much less stiff than he was yesterday.  The Thunderan doctor had told him that it would be so.  Even so, he made slow deliberate movements and began to pad around the room.

“It may not do for me to continue to move about in pajamas,” Thorin said, glancing at Bilbo.

“Fíli left you something to wear,” Bilbo said, from the hallway.  “Something contemporary, but I’m sure it’s to your taste.”

Bilbo continued to the kitchen.  Despite the replicator technology he’d brought back with him six years ago, he’d left the kitchen otherwise untouched, albeit with a more efficient oven and stovetop, and, of course a powered cooler.  Within he’d found all the uneaten pizza from the night before.  He chuckled and shook his head as he took a square for himself.

“There’s, erm, some leftovers from last night,” Bilbo called back.  “They say that cold pizza makes a fine breakfast, but I’ll, erm, let you decide for yourself, eh?”

Thorin entered the kitchen wearing a royal blue tunic, with twin vertical braids down the front.  The trousers were black and the boots he wore made solid reports on the hardwood floor.

“It looks right, but feels strange,” Thorin said, as Bilbo handed him a plate.  “The sleeves are—thank you—tight at the wrist, and the un—“

“Yes?” Bilbo said, bemusement in his voice as he grabbed his towel.  He began to wipe down the countertops.

Color began to creep up Thorin’s neck.  “At any rate, what can I do?”

“Grab the broom, and start sweeping up the crumbs,” Bilbo told him.  

Thorin did so, and as they began to wordlessly clean the kitchen, Bilbo resumed humming to himself, and sang a few lines once again.  “ _Let’s go in the garden, you’ll find something waiting…_ ” he sang.

 

“Ah, I’ve missed those quaint hobbit songs,” Thorin said, still sweeping.  He glanced at Bilbo and grinned.  “A song for every occasion.”

“It’s, erm, actually a Terran song,” Bilbo amended.  “Captain Reid taught it to me.”

“Terrans,” Thorin said, shaking his head.  “It’s hard to believe they can be trusted here.”

“Not where you’re from?” Bilbo asked.

“No.” Thorin shook his head again.  “They built a empire, subjugating hundreds of peoples in the quadrant, and only when they’d begun their reforms to become more benevolent, they were conquered by the Alliance.  Our world—barely—stayed neutral, even when the ships rose.”

“The Numenorean ships?  When did they arise on your world?” Bilbo asked.  “For us, it was only a decade ago.”

“The ships arose from the oceans not soon after—after the Battle,” Thorin said, leaning the broom against the wall.  “We found the signs of Numenor within, and the Dunedain—what little remained of them—were called to decipher them.  What they taught in so little time, also protected us against the Alliance when they sought to take what was not theirs.  The Alliance—and the Army of the Eye.”

“Well, here, the Men of the Terran Homeworld managed to stave off extinction—just barely—by allying themselves with the Vulcans and the Andorians, and the Tellarites, and after they banded together to fight the Romulans, they formed a Federation,” Bilbo explained.  “They eventually formed a philosophy of peace and to leave alone those worlds that were on their own paths.  That is why the Numenorean ships weren’t raised until recently.”

“Eighty years of innocence,” Thorin said.

“For some,” Bilbo admitted.  “Not for all of us.”

“Did you have knowledge of life beyond Arda?” Thorin asked.  “Balin had told me about the Empire, and their conquests of the stars—you?”

“Balin did indeed,” Bilbo admitted.  “He gave me books, literature, history…all the things I wasn’t supposed to know about in Middle-earth.  But then again,  I’d been changed by my experiences, and learning about life on other worlds seemed par for the course.  It was then that I’d decided that I’d tell my story and send it out there…and so I did.”

Thorin smiled warmly at Bilbo, and took a step toward him.  “It’s so amazing,” He said.  “What you accomplished.”

“I’m only telling the good parts,” Bilbo admitted.  “Those many years of feeling…wrong, because of that accursed device, of being devoured from within without even knowing.”

Thorin frowned.  “What?” 

Bilbo shook his head.  “You had your dragon-sickness, Thorin.  I had that Ring.”

Thorin’s eyes widened.  “Your invisibility ring?”

“It was indeed a Ring of Power,” Bilbo said.  “It turned out to be the Big One.  The one that started everything.”

Thorin looked lost.  “The War of the Ring, they’d called it.  _Your_ ring.”

Bilbo shook his head.  “Not mine.  Not in the end.  Do you want to know?”

And so, while they brought the cold tea service trays from the parlor to the kitchen, Bilbo explained how he’d taken in his cousins Drogo and Primula’s son Frodo when they’d died unexpectedly and raised him from a young lad.  How he’d left the Shire on his eleventy-first birthday, and how he’d slowly gotten away from the Ring.  From there, it was Frodo’s tale to tell.

Thorin’s brow knit together.  “I’m so sorry.  I wish—“

“Yes?” Bilbo looked at him.  He was now working on the cushions in the sitting room.  

Thorin spoke slowly, as if choosing his words very carefully.  “If there are other worlds where things happened differently for us, as they have, then I hope—for our counterparts’ sake—that there was at least one world where neither one or the other of us didn’t depart from the other.”  With that, Thorin stood up straight and nodded.

Touched, Bilbo put his cushion down and walked up to Thorin and put a hand on his cheek.  “That’s an amazing thing to say.”  He withdrew his hand and looked at Thorin for a moment, then a moment longer.  “Thorin Oakenshield,” he began, and then stammered for a moment, until he finally blurted it out.

“Were we in love, you and I?”

Thorin deflated when he said it, and sadly looked at Bilbo.  “ _Were_ we?” he answered back.

“Because, you see, we’d gotten closer and closer on our journey, my Thorin, and despite the one bit of unpleasantness, he seemed to come to like me.  And, of course there was those seemingly near misses, where we almost…and then we were interrupted.”

Thorin smiled, his eyes not quite meeting Bilbo’s.  “We had those moments as well.  I came to be quite fond of him—my Bilbo.”

“Do you think—if things had gone differently—“ Bilbo waved off the passive question and asked the real one.  “Did you love me?”

Thorin continued to stare at the floor.  “It’s the only thing that makes sense.  Why else would I have—why else would I feel that way?  Why else would I have hated myself so much?”

“Hated yourself?”  Bilbo patiently said.  

“Did you come to love him?” Thorin asked.  

“Don’t change the subj—“

“ _Did_ you?!” Thorin said, raising his voice for the first time.  

Bilbo Baggins plainly looked at Thorin and simply said, “Yes.”

Thorin blinked tears away from his eyes.

“I loved him enough to risk our friendship to save his life and sanity,” Bilbo continued.  “I loved him enough to be sent back to the Shire.”

“Loved him enough to risk your own life?” Thorin asked.  “You were a little foolish sometimes.”

“I was younger then,” Bilbo admitted.  “All those life lessons ahead.  The ones you helped to teach me.”

The two of them were still almost nose-to-nose, their foreheads touching.  “Go on then,” Bilbo goaded the Dwarf, smirking.  “Give an old hobbit a kiss.”

It was Thorin that broke away.  “We should finish this before my sister arrives,” he weakly said.

“Very well,” Bilbo sighed.  From the sitting room to the Parlor, they moved to straighten things up, including the umbrella holder that Thorin glanced at.  Bilbo continued to hum his tune.     “ _Right there where you left it, lying upside-down_ ,” He sang. Thorin wandered to another bookshelf, with volumes removed.  He picked one up, and flipped through it, revealing drawings within.

“These are unusual,” He murmured.  “The front is on the wrong side.”

“Oh!” Bilbo exclaimed.  “That’s my manga translations.  I work with a publisher on Arda to translate the stories from Japanese to Westron.  Which one have you got there?”

Thorin squinted at the print under the foreign characters on the front cover.  “Lupin the Third,” he said.

“ _Oh_ , that’s a good one!” Bilbo said.  He looked at the books littered atop the coffee table and sighed.  “Looks like the Company agreed as well.  I’ll have to inventory to see if anyone has ‘borrowed’ a volume.”

“What’s it about?” Thorin asked, flipping through the pages.  “And how do I read this?”

“The panels go right to left,” Bilbo explained.  “It’s about…” And then Bilbo laughed heartily.  “It’s about a burglar!”

Thorin cocked an eyebrow as he glanced at Bilbo and continued.  “Is he a good one?” he asked.

“Good enough to have the international police after him,” Bilbo explained as he gathered the books in his arm.  “And he’s as good with the women as he is with stealing things.  He doesn’t travel alone, mind.  He’s got his right hand man, Jigen, and a warrior, named Goemon, who work with him.  Not to mention the beautiful Fujiko!”

Thorin sat down, his cleaning work forgotten, as he was absorbed into the story.  Bilbo continued to work around him.  “If you like Lupin, you might like some of the Tezuka graphic novels I’ve translated.  The Phoenix series is particularly interesting.”

“How did you come to this?” Thorin asked.  

“The father of the turtle-lads is Japanese,” Bilbo explained.  “When we met, I told him of my passion for learning languages and translating volumes, and he suggested I learn his native language of Japanese.  From there, I found these centuries-old stories—think of them as akin to illuminated pages or tapestries, but bound in paper, with a forward narrative.  The lads called them ‘comic books’ but that hardly does the art justice, does it?”

Thorin looked at the illustrations.  Though it was a static image in each panel, Thorin could see that Lupin was a character that was constantly in motion, his arms flailing, his face contorted in some expression or another.  He was in stark contrast to Jigen, who was cool and still.  

“So,” he said at last.  “Would you say that you are like Lupin, while I am more like Jigen?” 

Bilbo screwed up his face in thought.  “Well,” he replied.  “I don’t think I’m quite as lusty as Lupin is.  And you’re not quite as low-key as Jigen.”

Still, Thorin thought.  It might be fun to attempt that chinstrap of a beard Jigen was wearing.

“Well, let’s see,” Bilbo scanned his manga bookshelf.  “Akira…Maison Ikkoku…Lone Wolf and Cub…Uzumaki…ohh, don’t read _that_ after dark…Oh!  Chobits, that was a charming one.”

Bilbo looked over to Thorin who continued to devour the Lupin books.  “I’ve also translated some other Terran literature to Westron, if you please.  “David Gerrold?   Diane Duane?  Nicholas Sparks?” 

“I was a very shy Dwarrow-lad,” Thorin said.  “I’d spend as much time as I could reading.  I had to be pried off of my seat to learn my numbers or how to fight.”

“I know,” Bilbo said.  “Your sister told me.”

“I’d have read stories like this like mad,” Thorin said.  “Sneak a candle in my bed chamber and risk setting my bed on fire to read.  Frerin nearly pulled my braids off my head when I almost did!”  And with that, Thorin threw back his head and laughed freely, for the first time since he’d awakened.  Bilbo joined him in laughter and clapped his back.  

And like that, Thorin stopped.  As if, Bilbo thought, he remembered he wasn’t supposed to be happy.

“We…we should continue,” Thorin finally said.

“Oh, Thorin,” Bilbo sighed.  “Won’t you tell me what happened to you?  I know you’re not from this world, but…” Bilbo put a hand to his mouth as he struggled to find the right words.  “Your entire being is filled with sorrow, and despite all this effort to lighten your spirit, it cannot depart you.”  Now Bilbo was sniffling.  “I wish with all my heart I could take it from you.  I wish I could have been there with you to—”

“But you weren’t.”  Thorin said, flatly.  

“Why wasn’t I?” Bilbo demanded.  “What happened to that Bilbo that he didn’t help you when you needed him the most?

“I—!” Thorin cried

“Yes?” Bilbo exclaimed, once again, in front of Thorin.  The Thorin he knew would never allow anyone to confront him so directly.  

“I—!” Thorin stammered again.

“ _What happened to me_?” 

 

“ ** _I KILLED YOU!_** ” Thorin wailed.

 

After Thorn’s voice rang out, The silence in Bag End covered them like a shroud.

Bilbo didn’t look shocked.  He nodded and sat Thorin down.  “That would have done it, yes.”

“Y-you don’t understand,” Thorin said.  “I…wanted to throw you down that wall to the rocks below.  I was going to do it!”

Bilbo nodded.  “You weren’t well.  You were under some kind of psychic attack.  It wasn’t you.”

“But…it was.  I could have picked you up with my bare hands and hurled you off that rampart, but as it was, the Company rebelled.  They rushed me, to get you to safety, to clap me in irons, to stop their mad King.  But my hand slipped…”. Thorin took a hand away from his face and thrust it toward Bilbo.  “I was snapped awake, I saw clearly what was happening, but it was too late!  Too late.  You dropped onto the top of the wall, but you went the wrong way.  You fell down to the rocks below.  We flew to the base of the Rampart.  They told me that, no, you were all right, you were wearing that shirt I’d given you.  You wouldn’t have suffered more than a final indignity.”

Bilbo maintained his calm gaze at Thorin.

“We came upon where you'd come to rest, and I knew immediately.  Your head was wrong.  Your neck…you’d snapped your neck.  And that was that.  There was no time to mourn, because there was a battle to fight.  And after…”

Thorin collapsed on the sofa, resting his head in Bilbo’s lap.  He was shuddering as he spoke, as if getting the words out were a physical effort.  Bilbo supposed that it was. 

“After, we took stock.  A third of the Company, dead.  Fíli and Kíli, alive, but maimed.  The Ur brothers, killed protecting me.  And _all those arrangements_ …”

“Funeral costs _were_ covered in the contract,” Bilbo recalled.

“And if nothing else, I would be true to my written word,” Thorin replied. “So your body was sent back to the Shire, quietly.  What funeral arrangements Pallando made for you with whatever family received you, I never found out.  And time passed on in the Mountain.  But on that throne…it stretched.  You know?”

Bilbo nodded.  “It was the same for me, with the Ring.”

“And It just…I couldn’t do anything.  I lay in chambers, while Balin and Dwalin quietly ruled as my proxies.  And before long, talk about producing an heir…”. Thorin shuddered again.  

“And it just kept going on and on…I could not stand feeling in that way.  It had to stop.  And so I worked in secret, arranging in writing for my cousin to become Crown Regent, while Fíli continued to recover. You know, Dain?”

“I remember him,” Bilbo said, as he stroked Thorin’s hair.

“Made all the arrangements.  I would not have the Kingdom I had rebuilt fall because of my…It would stand.

“So finally, I sent for an item from the Ered Luin, possibly because I thought I was being clever or poetic…I called for a poisoned Orcish blade.  And on the fifth anniversary…”

Thorin didn’t burst into tears.  He did not engage in ugly sobbing.  He lay there, head in Bilbo’s lap, keening his sorrow in low tones.  Bilbo recalled doing the same, when their roles were reversed.

“It’s all right,” Bilbo said.  “It’s all right.”

 

They stayed like that, for what seemed like an hour.  

 

“You have said nothing,” Thorin said at last.  “What must you think of this wretch who was once a King.”

“I think you are a Dwarf who was ill,” Bilbo replied.  “And that doesn’t make you weak, and it doesn’t make you a failure.  And, thanks to modern technology, it means you are a survivor.”

Thorin looked up at Bilbo.  

“You didn’t kill _me_ ,” Bilbo told Thorin, “And killing the other me was ultimately a terrible accident.”  Bilbo put his hand on Thorin’s cheek.  “And for what it’s worth…I forgive you.”

“Do you think he would have forgiven me?”

Bilbo leaned down, and kissed Thorin’s cheek, wet with his tears.  “There is more in you of good than you know, Thorin Oakenshield,” He told him.  “Oh!”  

Bilbo produced a piece of paper from his pocket.  “Found this cleaning.  It seems that you made quite the impression on our Commander K’gar last night.”

“That’s an understatement,” Thorin sighed, lifting his head back up.  

“Do you want to read it, or shall I?” Bilbo asked.

Thorin nodded.

 

“ _‘ The hardest thing in this world is to live in it._

_I learned that a lifetime ago from a woman whose memory inspires me daily._

_Live, Thorin._

 

_Buffi Mar’i K’gar.’_ ”

 

“Now that’s a woman you want on your side in a fight,” Bilbo remarked, and began to hum again.  

“Fíli wants me to come with him to Earth,” Thorin said.  “I’d much rather stay here with you.”

“Well, that’s a problem,” Bilbo replied.  “I don’t actually live here anymore!”

“Dr. Ch’tra said you were—“

“I am a benefactor of Bag End.  I share ownership of it with the Gamgee family, the son of my former gardener.  I put forth efforts to install modern comforts into the place, and they have a home for their ever-growing family.  The way it was meant to be.  Samwise serves on the _USS Mediterranean_ as its chief engineer—“

“A hobbit?!  An engineer?!” Thorin interjected.

“It’s a strange old world.  And we all come to call this place home, the Bagginses and the Gamgees.  And when you’ve gotten well, you may as well.”

“Do you think I should go with Fíli to San…San…”

“San Francisco is a fine Terran city,” Bilbo answered.  “Fíli is a fine doctor, and he will work tirelessly to get you to your fighting strength.”

“Will you visit me?” 

“Believe or not, I do have a residence on Earth!” Bilbo exclaimed.  “I have a hobbit hole residence not far from where Captain Reid grew up, in a place called Petros Park.  We can have tea daily, if you wish.”

“Can we visit the cows?” Thorin asked, a dry smile now creeping along his face.  

Bilbo leaned onto Thorin, his head resting on his shoulder, chuckling.  “Until the cows come home!” and with that they both laughed.

“Finish that song,” Thorin asked.

 

And Bilbo did.

 

_“Let’s go in the garden_

_You’ll find something waiting_

_Right there where you left it_

_Lying upside-down._

 

_When you finally find it_

_You’ll see how it’s faded_

_The underside is lighter_

_When you turn it around._

 

_Everything Stays_

_Right where you left it_

_Everything Stays_

_But it still changes_

_Ever so slightly_

_Daily and nightly_

_In little ways,_

_When Everything Stays.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Everything Stays" was written by Rebecca Sugar for "Adventure Time's" 'Stakes' mini-series.


End file.
